Jim Harbaugh Q&A

A transcription of 49ers coach Jim Harbaugh’s media session at the NFL scouting combine:
Q: On sitting on the Indiana basketball bench on Wednesday

Harbaugh: It was great. Great experience. Never sat on the bench with a basketball team. And it was a great honor to be there and to be in the locker room before and after the game and support the Indiana Hoosiers, who are near and dear to our hearts as a family. Our brother, Tom (Crean), who’s married to my sister, is the head coach at IU. It’s great. Got the extra special benefit of sitting next to my nephew, Riley Crean. So that was great. Twelve-year-old Riley Crean is also a good quarterback. But I was amazed at how much he had to explain to me about the game of basketball. I felt like I knew a lot about basketball. Well-documented outstanding high school player. But the schematics of the game – Riley was teaching me. It was great to be a part of it.

Q: On taking over a storied franchise/program, similarities with Crean

Harbaugh: Talked with Tom about team and both of our respective games ever since I met Tom because he’s just a star when it comes to coaching. Ever since he and Joanie first met and started dating, and especially when I made the transition from playing to coaching, Tom was a great resource for me.

Q: On Andrew Luck’s abilities

Harbaugh: You ever played spades? Trump games? He’s holding a lot of aces in a lot of suits.

Q: On Luck’s specific abilities.

Harbaugh: He’s got all the qualities, really, mentally, physically. He’s as prepared as anybody that you’re going to find. He’s really good. How about that one? He’s got a lot of talent.

Q: On the pressure Luck faces being compared to Manning, Elway, etc.

Harbaugh: Well, fair or unfair, it’s the nature of the business. But he’s very equipped to deal with it. He’s very mature.

Q: What stood out about Luck, his growth, etc?

Harbaugh: Many things

Q: Specifically?

Harbaugh: I know you’re looking for bullet points but … a lot of things. What specifically? … All great. Like I said, he’s one of the finest football players I’ve ever been around. Is that good enough? And an even better person. One of the top 5 guys I’ve been around. So he’s just a joy to coach. Not going to like playing against him. Not looking forward to that.

Q: On Robert Griffin . . .

Harbaugh: Yeah, I know a lot about Robert because we recruited Robert out of high school. Robert was a 4.0 student, great parents, comes from a great home. He has had great success at Baylor. You know, past performance usually indicates future success, and he’s had nothing but a history of success. So you would predict great achievements in the future.

Q: On Alex Smith’s future with the team

Harbaugh: Yeah, Alex is our guy. That’s well-documented. He had a tremendous season. Definitely as a coach, you worry about a lot of things. And when the quarterback’s not signed and is a free agent, that leads to some lost sleep. But I’m excited to be back at work, very excited to be here and see what kind of improvement we can make from year 1 to year 2, and I hope all our guys feel the exact same way.

Q: On Colin Kaepernick’s and Scott Tolzien’s progression as rookies

Harbaugh: Very well, very well. Both of those youngsters did as good a job or better than I’ve ever seen young quarterbacks approach the game. Both of them just sponges in terms of picking up as much as they possibly can. That first of all was the most impressive thing. I also liked the way they competed in practice, before practice, after practice. And the way they physically played. They belong, and I think an offseason is going to benefit both of those youngsters very much.”

Q: On going into his second combine

Harbaugh: I’m very much on edge. I’ve always felt like the most improvement you can make is from year 1 to year 2, much like a college freshman who the most improvement he can make in an entire one year of college football is going from year 1 freshman year to his sophomore year. Like a pro football player going from his rookie season to his second season. There’s a window there that will never come again that you have a chance to making your biggest strides. Like going from game 1 of a season to game 2 and that week is the opportunity to make the most
improvement you can in one weeks span over the course of a season. I’ll be on edge about going through this combine a second time and evaluating for the draft and as it relates to free agency, as it relates to our young quarterback, as it relates to all the football players on our team and on our team as a whole. And we’ll chase it. Just like the NASCAR boys, we’ll chase getting a mile an hour faster, chase getting .01 percent better any way that we can.

Q: On being the guy Peyton Manning replaced in Indy

Harbaugh: If you’re gonna be replaced by someone, that’s a pretty good one to be replaced by, isn’t it? I kind of take some pride in that.

Q: How remarkable is his career?

Harbaugh: I think that is the exact right word – remarkable. That your career would be something that people talk about and remark about. And in the history of the game, you’re talking about a quarterback whose career will be talked about for 50, 100 years to come. He’s been that kind of player in the National Football League. Very remarkable. Good word.

Q: On going deeper into the Year 1-to-Year 2 improvement . . .

Harbaugh: Because everything you’re doing, you’re doing it for the second time. You’re doing it again. You’ve already experienced it one time. You’ve experienced the speed of the game, the potholes, the things that can come up. You’re doing it again. You’ve got some muscle memory there. And it only is if you take advantage of it, if you attack it. That’s been my experience. I have no empirical data to share with you at this time. That’s my personal experience.

Q: On being familiar with guys coming out of college

Harbaugh: That is true. That’s the first thing I do when I look at the list is go through each one and – I know that guy; we played against him. I remember Zebrie Sanders when we recruited him or RG III, etc. So I go through that list and that’s the first thing I do look at. … I can’t wait to find these guys and find out why they didn’t come to Stanford. Confront ‘em!

Q: Will we see more of Kendall Hunter?

Harbaugh: You saw a lot of Kendall Hunter last year. Don’t think there would be any reason not to. He did a fabulous job for us in two phases – offensively and in the area of special teams. And he just works so darn hard at it. And he likes football so much and he’s willing to spend extra classroom time. Kendall’s a guy who’s in at 7:30 in the morning and meets extra with Tom Rathman as some of the other running backs – Frank Gore does it as well and so does AD (Anthony Dixon). But he’s got that passion for it. So, all arrows, all indicators would be yes for that question.

Q: How has (Ted Ginn?) evolved?

Harbaugh: Evolved? I mean he’s like any football player, you want him to evolve. You want him to continue to do that.
And Ted was outstanding for us this past offseason. So you look for ways to do that?

Q: Recall the last conversation with Griffin?

Harbaugh: To say he’s going to Houston and then to Baylor? Yes, I do. … I was really fond of Robert through the recruiting process, and he made that decision. I think you’ve all had a chance to get to know Robert so far and understand him a bit. He makes good decisions. He makes cool decisions. He’s very conscientious in everything that he does, and I respected his decision and wished him well.

Q: Memories on Indianapolis?

Harbaugh: Some of the best memories of my life. I love the Midwest, I loved playing here in Indianapolis. There’s that memory. There’s the memory of, we were pretty close to playing here a couple of weeks ago. So mostly good, though. Almost the signature years of my life when I think back at those four years here in Indianapolis. The people above everything. Working with you, working with my teammates and coaches. There was a great feeling with the community and it was all so positive as I reflect back on it.

Q: On similarities in lost championship games

Harbaugh: Both tough. The same feeling. There’s mixed emotion there. On one hand, your team gave it everything they had in both cases, when played with the Colts and also this year our team with the 49ers. I mean, talking about them they played their hearts out. They gave it everything they had. They gave it their best. Technically you can say, ok, it wasn’t good enough because you didn’t win that game against the Giants and you didn’t go on to being in the Super Bowl. We would have loved to have been in that football fight. But also the team was – you just feel
so proud that you’re part of a team that did play their hearts out and did give it their best and played extremely well in the championship game. That game could have gone our way. And then the other emotion of just being excited to get back to work. Just being here and understanding that you’ve got to get better because you draft lower, you play a division-winning schedule. And all of the other teams are competing their tails off the same way we are. So that brings a lot of energy, brings a lot of juice to getting back to work. And I know all our coaches feel the exact same way. That emotion – being here and being excited to get going.

Q: On watching film of the Giants game

Harbaugh: Yes, watched the game. It was two great teams. … There’s technical reasons for watching it, understanding the game and where you can find what you did well and what you can improve on. And also I enjoy watching our guys play. I really get a kick out of that. That really fires me up, watching our guys compete.